TINOT 28

Chapter: 28

“Sir Ryan, thanks to you I survived. But what exactly happened yesterday?”

“Ah, well, yesterday was my day off. I was drinking with Wilhelmina in the shopping district and heading home when I spotted magical beasts loitering in the middle of the capital. When I saw them gathering toward the Marquess Aster’s residence, I thought His Highness the Grand Duke should know, so I sent an urgent report.”

“……”

“After that, just like you know, I beat down a few magical beasts, but then a basilisk suddenly appeared, and while I was chasing it… well, that’s the whole story.”

It did seem strange.

But she also thought there was no reason for him to lie, so she didn’t dig too deeply.

“And those red eyes—that was Richter, right? What the hell is Richter doing in the capital! Ugh! Those devil-like fire freaks. Bunch of bed-wetting arson maniacs who’ll never outgrow playing with fire!”

Perhaps she had always held a grudge against the Richter Count family—Scylla hurled an impressive variety of bizarre insults.

“So, since you got caught, you moved the execution date to today?”
Lysithea asked, sheathing her sword.

Letting out a sigh of relief, Scylla vigorously rubbed his neck as if checking it was still attached.

“Of course. The whole point of this plan was the surprise attack. If the Aster marquess household caught on and tightened security, wouldn’t your plan be finished?”

Scylla glanced sideways at Lysithea, watching her reaction.

When she gave no particular reply, he seemed to think his excuse was working, and his voice grew noticeably smug.

“That’s where I used my wits. If we failed like this, our precious client’s escape would be gone for good. There wouldn’t be another chance.”

“……”

“So I just gathered up as many magical beasts as I could. Ah, of course, even I didn’t expect a basilisk to show up.”

Lysithea silently fiddled with the sword sheath in her hand.

“Hey, I risked my life on this too, you know. I could’ve just run when we got exposed, but I braced myself to die and delivered exactly what you wanted—the monster package! Bam! Huh?”

“Listen to yourself talking about some ‘monster package.’”

Lysithea mercilessly smacked Scylla across the back with the sheathed sword.

Thwack! Thwack!
Each dull impact made Scylla’s back curl up like a squid grilled over fire.

“I said I wanted to get out of that house. Did I say I wanted to leave this world?”

No sane person wants to fight a basilisk barehanded without preparation.

Given the snake-type beast’s habit of swallowing prey whole… she might have remained conscious for a while even after being eaten.

Just imagining it was horrifying.

The unpleasant thought made her grip tighten on the sheath.

“No, then what was I supposed to do! You said you’d kill me if this failed too!”

Unable to take more hits, Scylla quickly rolled away and raised his voice in protest.

“That’s why you hire expensive mercenaries with all that money. Did I work you for free? You take that payment and can’t even handle this level of emergency?”

For a mercenary who had failed the job, he sure had a lot of excuses.

“I only managed that much because it’s me! If it weren’t for me, the whole thing would’ve collapsed!”

Shouting indignantly, Scylla glanced nervously at Lysithea’s hand gripping the sheath.

“…You done hitting?”

THUD!

Lysithea punctuated things with one last heavy blow before lowering the sheath.

“There’s no success fee. This request is a failure.”

“Now hold on, Client. I worked this hard—maybe not all of it, but at least half the payment—”

Scylla flapped his singed robe in protest.

Lysithea grabbed the hood and practically flung him away from her.

“Marie almost died. If Marie had died, I really wouldn’t have let you live.”

“N-no, that wasn’t my—”

Lysithea silently clenched her fist.

The surge of blood in her body intensified, and realizing his mistake, Scylla immediately bowed low, rubbing his hands together.

“My fault. Entirely my fault. So… shall we keep this request our little secret?”

He was asking her not to spread word of this incident.

“Well…”

If it were revealed to be a staged affair, it wouldn’t benefit Lysithea either.

That was why she had carried it out secretly—even from Marie.

“…I was drinking with Wilhelmina in the shopping district when I spotted magical beasts…”

“I thought a lot about what I should say when you woke up… but I don’t know myself.”

Ryan, Wilhelmina, and even Diamuid.

That meant at least three more people knew this wasn’t a simple magical beast attack.

Just thinking about how to explain this to Diamuid already gave her a headache.

“Obviously. Just keep that loose mouth of yours shut.”

With a sigh, Lysithea waved her hand dismissively, telling him to get lost.

“Haah… and Cullinan came all this way…”

Staggering to his feet, Scylla stretched both arms toward the air and muttered in a desperate voice.

He really looked unhinged.

When Lysithea showed no reaction, Scylla trudged over and hooked a foot onto the windowsill.

“Then I’m going.”

He looked ready to vanish the moment the farewell was done.

It was very different from the past, when every meeting with him wasted time on endless useless chatter.

“You seem busy these days. What have you been up to?”

“You know how my work is. When was I ever not busy… What’s the point of being the continent’s top mercenary? I live without holidays. The stuff I’ve been doing lately is so miserable I can’t even sleep peacefully at night.”

Scylla lamented his lot in a groaning voice.

“Right, so hurry up and leave. Even if you can’t sleep, I need to.”

“Your personality, seriously… I’m going, I’m going. Ugh—what’s this now.”

While grumbling, Scylla struggled for a moment as if his hair had snagged on the window frame, then abruptly jumped down and vanished into the darkness.

‘What should I say to him…’

Sighing, Lysithea moved to close the window—then froze.

Something strange was caught on the window frame.

She pulled it free and held it up in the moonlight.

One of the differently colored clumps was clearly a brown wig.

And the other was Scylla’s real hair that had been hidden beneath it.

The moment she saw the unusually colored strands, someone who had recently appeared in the capital came to mind.

Lysithea clenched the hair tightly.

The same pink hair as the heroine of this world—Lilian Rose.

‘Scylla… did you stab me in the back again?’

She considered the possibility that this was merely coincidence.

“Th-that was something my underlings accepted while I was away! If I’d been there, I never would’ve taken that request!”

What were the odds that the continent’s best mercenary would fail a request to stop Joel Spencer without any special circumstances?

And what were the odds that the period when Scylla’s contact became sparse just happened to coincide with Lilian Rose’s sudden appearance?

Lysithea opened the drawer and casually tossed in the hair Scylla had left behind.

With all the tangled thoughts circling her mind, sleep seemed impossible tonight.

“We will begin the examination, so please relax.”

The physician advised as he took out his medical instruments.

It was the very same doctor Diamuid had summoned through Marie—the one who had once given Lysithea a terminal diagnosis.

Holding his tools, the blind physician carefully examined various parts of Lysithea’s body.

A bluish light seeped from the device in his hand.

It was a magic tool powered by mana.

It seemed this physician had overcome the handicap of blindness with the aid of such tools.

Though every human possessed mana, using it skillfully was another matter entirely.

To manipulate magical tools this delicately required considerable training.

“Hmm. Have you recently suffered any major loss of vitality or overexertion?”

After finishing the examination, the physician asked.

“Nothing particularly different from usual—”

Lysithea had been about to shake her head absentmindedly when her eyes met Marie’s.

Marie pressed her lips tightly, as if trying to hold back tears.

Seeing that, Lysithea couldn’t bring herself to claim nothing had happened.

Recalling the time her forehead had been torn by a harpy’s claws, she confessed.

“I did… overexert my body somewhat.”

“How severe was the exertion?”

“I got into a bit of a sword fight. Until I coughed blood and passed out.”

“Ah…”

The blind physician let out an ambiguous sound and sighed knowingly in time with Marie’s muffled sobs.

“If I may speak frankly, when I said you had at most one year to live, it did not guarantee a full year. If you continue to push yourself like this, you may not even reach that time.”

“So you’re saying I won’t live even a year now?”

“…Not exactly.”

The physician, who had seemed deep in thought, soon shook his head.

That was strange.

When he received word from Lysithea again, he had thought the inevitable moment had finally come.

She had struck him as the type who would only seek him out when she was truly dying.

He had come prepared for that—yet Lysithea’s condition was far better than he had expected.

“You mentioned recently changing your living environment. How is it?”

“It can’t even be compared to before.”

“In a good way?”

“Of course.”

The physician nodded as if finally understanding.

“The body and the mind are far more closely connected than people think. Keep your mind at ease, and try to be more generous in all things. Your body will respond in kind.”

“Be more generous… that’s quite the difficult request for me.”

Lysithea let out a low chuckle. She had never once been generous to anyone in her life.

“Above all, just because you feel somewhat better, you must not overexert yourself. Carelessness is forbidden.”

The physician repeated the warning in a somewhat stern tone.

In his experience, patients often deteriorated rapidly right after their condition improved.

“But telling someone with only a year left not to overexert—isn’t that the same as telling me to do nothing? I don’t have much time remaining.”

Lysithea murmured wistfully as she gazed out the window.

The spring flowers that had been in full bloom were already scattering in the wind, and the trees were preparing for the coming summer.

There was much to do, and too little time.

Even if impatience gnawed away at her life, she could not simply stop.

“…Even so, it is my duty to say it. I am a physician, and you are my patient, my lady.”

“That’s true.”

She liked him.

Not only was he tight-lipped, but he also held firm convictions about his work.

“You seem quite skilled at handling mana. It’s been a while since I’ve seen someone manipulate magical tools so deftly.”

Lysithea added while quietly watching the blind physician feel along his instruments and pack them neatly into his bag.

The physician replied as he lifted the bag.

“Had I been born blind, perhaps things would be different. But as I lost my sight day by day, this was the only thing left for me to cling to. I was not blessed by the stars, but fortunately my mana was sufficient.”